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I am very proud and excited to announce The End of Capitalism’s first, and probably only, LOGO DESIGN CONTEST!

Our audience has been growing rapidly as the crisis has deepened and more and more people are searching for answers. However, the website needs to grow along with this attention. Therefore, endofcapitalism.com is undergoing a total re-design! (See below for a rough draft prototype of the re-design.)

We need to upgrade our appearance. How could this be complete without a logo?

Here’s where you come in. Submit the best logo and win the prizes detailed below.

"sad broker #19"

Style

You can use “sad broker #19” as a starting point. I really like this image. However, if you have a better idea, that’s fine too.

What I love about the sad broker image is that it 1) exemplifies the failing of the capitalist system, 1a) has a downward graph in the background that evokes the death of the stock market, and 2) is campy and light-hearted.

This reflects my basic message that global capitalism is on its last legs, and that that’s a very good thing – an opportunity, not an apocalypse. So I want the logo to be fun and inviting, NOT scary or dark.

It needs to say The End of Capitalism on it.

In terms of colors, I like light ones. Blues, greens, whites. Nature. The idea again is to inspire hope, renewal, joy, not fear.

Notice the imagery and feelings evoked by the two phrases. The first has a Germanic origin, the second, French. The English language is split along class lines — a reflection of the Norman invasion of England, almost 1000 years ago. German-derived English words carry with them a working class connotation, and French-derived words come off sounding aristocratic and slightly repulsive.

Even though cordial literally means “of the heart” in French (cor is Latin for heart), the picture that comes to my mind is a royal douchebag entering a hall of power amidst classical music and overdressed patrons and nobility. The image I get from hearty welcome is the extreme opposite: a single peasant reaching out to hug me and get me into their little hovel, out of the weather. Class is deeply embedded within our language, each word having its own unique history.

Old German — the Angles and Saxons (from Saxony) conquered Britain in the 5th century, mixing with Scandinavians and developing Old English.

Old French — the Normans (from Normandy) conquered England in 1066.

William the Conqueror, first Norman king of England, as depicted on the famous Bayeux Tapestry. His royal descendents would speak French until Henry V, 350 years later.

After the Norman invasion, England was dominated by a small French aristocracy, ruling over a much larger German working class. For more than three centuries, the rulers of England spoke French, while the common person spoke a Germanic language (Old English).

The two cultural groups began to intermarry after the Black Death of the 1340s wiped out half of the population, and over time the languages slowly merged, greatly simplifying the grammar of English, but also leaving a huge combined vocabulary.

The really interesting thing is that a lot of words in English carry a class connotation, based on whether they derive from French or from German. Words that mean basically the same thing will have either a formal, fancy, academic, upper-class connotation, or a casual, down-to-earth, gut-level, working-class feeling depending on the origin of the word.